


This Is Not There And Then

by Conifer



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: It will probably be sad, M/M, Mostly Canon Compliant up to WALK, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, So don't worry, but will have a happy ending
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-03
Updated: 2014-03-05
Packaged: 2018-01-14 09:20:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1261138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Conifer/pseuds/Conifer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>So very many things have gone so very wrong. <br/>The Blinking Light Up On The Mountain has stopped blinking. <br/>There is something coming.<br/>There is something that is here.<br/>There is something that has passed. <br/>And it may be the end of it all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

A man steps out of a van into cool, salty air. There is nothing special about this action - not in general, at least, but this particular man stepping out of this particular van is far from inconsequential.   
The man in question is wearing a long, white jacket. It looks official - a lab coat, maybe. Perhaps he is a scientist. Perhaps he is not. Perhaps he was, once upon a time, and this is a habit he has not lost. He is, however, somber - the air around him dare not move for fear of upsetting him. He does not belong here.   
His eyes contain stories. Hundreds and thousands of them, haunting and mysterious, but he does not speak of any. Instead his lips are formed into a soft frown as he looks around. After a moment, he reaches into the pocket of his coat, pulling out a small device that is emitting thin, shaking beeps as if the batteries powering it were nearly depleted. The man looks at it for a long moment before slipping it back into his pocket and glancing at a well-worn watch adorning his wrist. The face is cracked, and the hands do not move - they have long ago stopped attempting to keep track of time. He knows this, but looks anyway. He is not looking to know the time. 

The van is dark and dusty, tinted windows hiding away whatever it is that’s hiding inside. Like the man, it does not look significant. Like the man, it is far more important than one would assume. 

A young woman in a deep purple t-shirt is stepping out of it now.   
She looks confused, as if she is not entirely sure where it is that she belongs or where it is that she is. There is a cell phone in her palm, a text half-written and entirely forgotten on its screen. The battery should be long dead, but somehow, it is not. It as if it has forgotten how. It is fitting, considering that the woman seems to have forgotten as well.

The man does not see her, though he turns his head in her direction, hearing her move in the tall grass. His eyes will not focus on her. She has grown accustomed to this.  
She does not see him, either, but that is because she is not looking and not because she can’t. She is, instead, looking down off the cliff on which they stand. A town is on the coastline, the epitome of a small fishing village, all wind-battered buildings and flapping flags and clear, salty air. There is half-melted snow on the roofs of the buildings, and people milling around the streets, chatting and laughing and living. Nothing seems to be wrong. 

Everything will be wrong very, very soon. 

The perfect-haired man draws his coat tighter around himself as the two of them stare down at the town. It is cold - very cold, and it offers little protection against the chilling breeze.   
He has made it, after all this time. He knows that he will find the answers he is looking for here. He knows he will find the solutions that he needs here.

Nulogorsk, Russia. September 23, 1983.   
The day before it dies.


	2. The No Longer Blinking Light Up On The Mountain

“Cecil? I don’t know if you can hear me. I hope you can.” 

He doesn't hear her, but that doesn't stop her from talking. It has become a lifeline, of sorts. A way to cling to the idea that everything is normal and that she is still an intern and things have not changed from that. 

But they have changed. So, so much. 

Dana sighs, stretching out in the chair that is so much like Cecil’s had been, but was a slightly different color. She’s not positive how she knows this, she never paid much attention to the shade of the chair, but she knows. Everything is just a little bit off, here. Wherever ‘here’ may be. 

“I’m at the station.” She says softly, though she knows it’s not completely true. She’s at a station. “There’s no one else here. No station management, no interns, not even those shadows in the break room. I checked. Everything is….empty. Like it was once full but then sprung a leak and everything fell out, barely even noticing where it was going. I’m not sure I like it, Cecil.” This, also, is not completely true. She knows she doesn't like it. She does not like the way the shadows stretch over the mug on the desk - half full of some viscous substance that smells ever-so-faintly of coffee and freshly-cut grass. She does not like the way there is nothing and yet it feels like there is something, huge and stifling and impending. She does not like how helpless she feels to it all. 

“I went to the lighthouse again, Cecil.” She continues, ignoring the chill that goes down her spine as she says the words. “I climbed it. I...I saw the settlement in the gorge, again, and it reminded me of home. I don’t even remember what home means, anymore, besides Night Vale. Besides my mother and brother. Besides the station. Is that home?”

She pauses, considering this for a moment. 

“Anywhere is home, I suppose, if you decide that it is.” Is what she finally decides, and says as much. “The light on the mountain has stopped blinking. It is a steady stream of light, now. Pointing away, far away, from where I sit now. I’m watching it. It does not move. I...think it wants me to follow it, Cecil.”

Dana sighs, running her fingers through her hair, pulling slightly. It’s a habit she’s developed since the Dog Park - or maybe before then, but she didn’t notice. The pressure is an assurance that she is here and she is real. Or as real as anything is, in this desert. She does not think about that too much. 

“I wish that you were here to tell me what to do.” She said, allowing herself a moment of weakness - one that she has not allowed herself in a very, very long time. “I wish I knew what you would say. But I don’t. Because...Because the light is _beautiful_ , Cecil. It wants to be followed. I want to follow it. But the settlement...I want to find out what happened there. I want to find out what happened _here_. But the light…” She pauses, then repeats, her voice sounding slightly frantic. “The light, Cecil, is beautiful.” 

And then she signs off.  
Unceremoniously, unprofessionally, and suddenly. But there is nothing else to say, no more words that want to leave her mouth. Not even a goodbye. She is still stuck in her moment of weakness, and she cannot speak. She’s pulling hard on her hair now, eyes shut tight as she reminds herself that she is _so very real_. And then, as quickly as it came, the panic is passed and she is fine. She _is_ fine. She is _fine_. _She is fine._

Dana pulls herself out of the chair jerkily, shifting the mug further back onto the desk so it doesn’t fall off. She knows it will be back where it started in the morning - It has every other time that she moved it, but she does it anyways. She always has. Sign off, move the mug, go to bed. She’s made up a camp, in the break-room. It reminds her of home - what she has decided is home, at least. Also the couch, however threadbare and lumpy, is more comfortable than anywhere else she’s found. She turns the lights out in the booth as she leaves, the ON AIR sign’s bright red dimming to a deep burgundy as the room goes dark. 

The sounds outside the walls of the station have started. It’s later than she thought. They aren't malicious sounds, not really, but they are frightening and haunting all the same. They are nearly indescribable - lips blowing air over the top of a bottle, creatures howling at the moon, the sounds of the sense of unease. Sometimes, they are beautiful in their terror. Tonight they are not. 

Tonight she is reminded of the orange triangles that grew and shrunk as she collapses as unceremoniously as the ending of her ‘broadcast’ onto the couch, shifting until she’s as comfortable as she is going to get.

Tonight she wonders if she’ll ever find home, or if she even has a home to return to. 

Tonight she wonders if she is Dana or Dana’s Double, and who was the one that was killed.

Tonight, she watches the No Longer Blinking Light Up On The Mountain, and tries her best to  
rest. She knows that she will need it.

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first multi-chaptered fic in a very, very long time, but ever since episode 40 I have become rather fascinated with what might have happened with Nulogorsk. Thus, this spawned.


End file.
